Is there any hope for piquet?

MattD1zzl3

MattD1zzl3

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I'll be frank, this is my first season watching formula one in its entirety, i caught on late in the 2007 season (see:thread on "video requests")

Now this poor fellow has a record of good results in lesser formula series, a fine racing heritage, and occasional flashes on what could be a fine GP driver. The thing i cant comment on is the empathy of the highest echelon of motor sport on a newbie. Does this guy (and buy extension, any rookie who doesn't so so well) have a shot at a f1 seat next year? Lets be honest, your first time doing anything is tough, but when put in a seat where a 2 time champion struggles to maintain midfield, do you expect a new boy to do what this guy has done?

The whole f1 fanbase is calling for this guys blood, and i think he deserves another season to prove himself, what do you think? (bonus points for guessing mattdizzles level of intoxication in thinking anything but "lol piquet sucks".)
 
I don't think there is and it's a shame. He definitely has potential otherwise he wouldn't be driving in F1 but sometimes it seems he has to the wrong attitude during some chats with interviewers. But then again I'm sure he can't be happy with every interviewer.

Compared to Alonso he looks like shit but a lot of drivers compared to Alonso (driving the same car) would look like shit. I'd imagine the engineers set up the car to Alonso's liking and maybe Piquet has a very different driving style.


Maybe Force India will grab him? or Honda?
 
I'd like him to get another go next season, but I just don't see it happening.
 
doubtful. He does have some talent, he just has difficulty displaying said talent for a period of 2 hrs straight.

Also, most of the stuff he did was 1000% his fault
I'd give him a few more years in the lesser series like GP2, and then have him come back
 
F1 (and in particular Flavio Briatore) can be a cruel bitch. Piquet hasn't performed up to expectations this year, so I can't see him keeping any F1 drive next year.
 
He hasn't had a great first season, but Renault seem to have handled him very badly. They should have given him every testing mile they possibly could before he turned a wheel in a race. Every time the team gets on the radio to him it's to tell him to push. Alonso will get the vast majority of the mechanics and engineers time. They use Nelson as the expendable test subject (Monaco, where they put him out as the first driver on slicks on a wet track), as he explained in Singapore his setup was wrong with the car bottoming out but the team were still telling him to drive faster.

He would have still had a sub-par first season, but Renault have to shoulder some blame for not handling his form right.
 
Piquet's biggest issue is that there are more drivers in the pipeline, several of which (Lucas DiGrassi and Romain Grosjean) have shown more promise than he has.

Steve
 
I guess di Grassi will get the Renault seat next year, but it's not all over for Piquet, Renault (or another team) employ him as a test driver and if he makes a really good impression, he can get back to racing.

If you think back to his first GP2 season (2005) he was quite crap, similar to this year, many people said that he was just their because of his dad. Then came 2006 and he finished 2nd in the championship (behind Hamilton) with some impressive wins.

Remember, he's just 23 years old, I think we'll see him in F1, if not next year than later...
 
Rewind to 1979. Some newkid called Nelson Piquet made his debut. His Brabham wasn't particularly good, and his only points finish was fourth at Zandvoort.

Two years later he was World Champion...
 
Ironlord said:
Rewind to 1979. Some newkid called Nelson Piquet made his debut. His Brabham wasn't particularly good, and his only points finish was fourth at Zandvoort.

Two years later he was World Champion...
Click to expand...

And, to emphasize the fact, in the team in which he scored his first point.

1979: 4th in Zandvoort, 3 points, 15th in the Championship.

1980, the first serious year of the Brabham BT49: 3 wins, 2nd in the championship.

1981: World Champion.
 
Yeh but if Nelson Mk II could do that I would eat my hat.

Times have changed. The easiest way to compare is in 1979 where did the other Brabham come?
 
Haven't we see that Jr needs a year to get used to the racing..It took him till his second season in GP2 to be competitive so I guess he needs at least a few more races to see his worth.
 
Necx0 said:
Yeh but if Nelson Mk II could do that I would eat my hat.

Times have changed. The easiest way to compare is in 1979 where did the other Brabham come?
Click to expand...
Not much better, actually... Nelson senior scored three points while Niki Lauda managed... four.

I never mentioned that in the hope that no-one would notice...
 
Renault got rid of Heikki Kovalainen, and he was doing a lot better than Piquet was. I don't think it's fair for Piquet to take a year to be total crap, while all the other drivers are expected to at least be fairly competitive with their teammates. Nelson's dad said that Jr. has done more races already than he's done in his entire career. Nelson has a lot of experience, but he just isn't getting it done.

I would put Di Grassi in the seat, because Renault have said he's been very impressive in testing. He tested all 3 days in Jerez recently. He also would have walked the GP2 title this year if he didn't miss the first 6 races, yet he still managed to win a few times and finish 3rd in the championship, only a couple points behind Senna.
 
Effectively Nelsinho's only hope is that Alonso will head off somewhere else. Which, seeing the number of unconfirmed seats left, is quite a slight hope at that. If Alonso left Renault the team's options would be rather limited. There are no top drivers available, and I find it unlikely that Renault would rather go for two complete rookies (di Grassi & Grosjean) than keep one guy who, despite his lack of results, has a full year of experience and is already familiar with the team.

If Alonso does what I think is the most likely thing and remains at Renault Piquet is in serious trouble. There are very few seats for him to get to, and since he does not have (AFAIK) a big sponsorship package behind him unlikely he'll get anywhere. Unless Renault would be willing to pay for his drive, which I doubt. A testing seat is possible but very few of those who go to that route without a done deal for race seat later have made it back. Same goes for GP2 drive, look at where Giorgio Pantano is now.

Would he deserve another chance? In my view he does as he is in a really tricky position this year, being a rookie in a team with lot of success until last year, with Fernando Alonso beside him as someone who is a two time world champion and has already established his position within the team. I would like to see Nelsinho do a season for one of the backmarker teams without the amount of pressure he is under at the moment.
 
Nelson needs another go imo.

And that fella on the radio, has to lay off the 'keep pushing' crap.
 
mclarensmps said:
Thing is... all drivers get that flack.

Remember Kubica?

"I'm trying... I'm trying...." :lol:

I love radio transmission broadcasts :D
Click to expand...

lol that was great!
 
kubica's transmissions are pretty amusing. hes pretty sarcastic in the car. :lol:
 
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